A Modest Proposal
by anavoli
Summary: Connie's getting ready to propose to Sasha. It's a nerve racking moment that consisted of weeks of preparation and even asking Annie for advice. Evidently it gets easier, because as soon as Connie proposes, Sasha suggests they do it again. Bad idea right? But hey, it's for the sake of free food!


"This is a nice restaurant, Connie, you've really outdone yourself this time."

Sasha sighed happily. They sat in the true definition of an elegant restaurant, from the roses on the table to the oh-so-soft plush seats. There was even _wine_. And there was no better way to Sasha's heart than with good food and wine.

Connie grinned in his usual cheeky way. "Anything for you, my dear."

His girlfriend rolled her eyes. "You sappy oaf."

La Pomme de Terre was a fine location, with five-star French cuisine so expensive Connie could already feel his pockets emptying. But it was going to be delicious and this was about to become one of the most important moments of his life. What was a little money anyways?

"Madame, how may I serve you tonight?" the waiter asked, refilling Sasha's wine glass with a flourish.

She pursed her lips in that adorable way of hers, before pointing a finger at something on the menu. "Escargots à la Bourguignonne, se il vous plaît."

Her order was taken with a quick swish of ink on paper. "And for you, monsieur?"

"I'll have the cold-smoked herring with potato salad and greens," Connie responded.

The waiter took their menus and left them to sit in the company of violin music.

"Only herring?" Sasha teased. "No escargots tonight?"

"They're good, but I'd rather not risk offending anyone with my incompetence with the French language."

Sasha giggled into her wine glass. "True. I'll let you have some of mine."

He feigned surprise. "Sasha Braus would share food with a lowly peasant such as I?"

Raising her chin higher, Sasha replied, "I am feeling rather benevolent today."

"To my good fortune then," Connie raised his glass with a twinkle in his eye.

When their food arrived, it smelled so delicious it was like they had died and gone to heaven. This was almost a dream come true.

"Mmm, this is so good!" Sasha squealed after her first bite. "My kind of ambrosia, lemme tell you."

"Wanna try some of my potato salad?" Connie asked, extending a fork-full.

Sasha leaned forward and took a bite. "Oooh, this is really good."

"Did you know that potatoes are part of the Solanaceae, or nightshade, family?"

"What?" Her eyes widened. "Now way, that's so cool!"

The rest of the meal went by quickly, with Connie cracking jokes every five seconds and Sasha's laughter ringing in the air.

When the waiter came by to ask if they wanted dessert however, Connie's heart sped up like he had just taken three shots of pure caffeine.

This was the moment. Right here, right now.

Connie cleared his throat. "Actually, I don't need dessert tonight."

He heard a gasp from his right. Sasha stared at him, mouth agape. "What do you mean you don't need dessert?"

Standing up and sweeping one of Sasha's hand with his hand, Connie pressed a kiss to Sasha's hand and smiled. "Because I've already got the sweetest thing right here." And then he knelt down on one knee.

She snorted. "No way, are you-"

Reaching into his pocket, Connie's face dropped into seriousness so quickly even Sasha went silent.

"Sasha Braus," Connie started. "I first met you on the side of the road in Mexico, and for some reason I made the decision to pick up the crazy girl who didn't speak a word of Spanish and give her a ride to the airport. It was the best decision of my life, and it led many more adventures."

At this point, Sasha didn't know if she should laugh or cry.

Connie revealed a stunning ruby and onyx ring. "And if you would do me the honor...I'd like to go on adventures for the rest of our lives."

The restaurant erupted into applause, with a few whistles tossed in here and there. Then they all waited with bated breath for the response.

Sasha then proceeded to take one of the roses from the table and tap his shoulders with it. "Arise, sir knight!" she declared. "I would be honored to spend the rest of my days with thee."

Then she threw her arms around him and nearly squeezed him to death.

The owner of the restaurant was overcome with the romantic display, and the newly engaged couple walked out of the restaurant with happy hearts and a free meal.

"Wow," Sasha breathed. "How'd you know I'd like this ring?"

"I asked Annie," Connie replied sheepishly. "She knew exactly what you'd like. Plus I knew she could keep a secret."

"This is probably the best night of my life," Sasha hummed. "Free food, great wine, everything I'd ever want."

"Well in that case," Connie suddenly got the most brilliant idea of his life. "What if we did it again?"

-x-x-x-x-x-

Two days later, they chose an Italian restaurant overlooking the city, with the best breadsticks and marinara sauce they had ever tasted. Conversation went as normal, although half the time was spent giggling madly over the stunt they were about to pull.

The clock chimed ten, and Connie leapt up from his chair with a glass of champagne.

"Aleksandra Braus!" he announced loudly, and knelt at her feet. Sasha almost laughed out loud at that - was he serious?

The whole restaurant went silent, witnesses of what was about to occur. The greatest scam - proposal, whatever - the world had ever known.

Revealing the engagement ring, which was just as beautiful as the first time she had seen it, Connie said, "Would you do this poor gentleman the honor of your hand in marriage?"

Sasha pressed a hand to her chest. "Oh, Connie, of course I will!"

He slid the ring on her finger and then Sasha grabbed his arm and dipped him into a kiss.

The couple practically waltzed out of the restaurant, hand in hand. Sasha had accidentally gotten gelato smeared on Connie's shirt, but he didn't mind - it was free anyways.

"Aleksandra Braus?" Sasha laughed. "Where did that come from?"

Connie shrugged. "I read somewhere that Sasha's a nickname for Alexandra, and I put a little flair to it because who doesn't want to be a Russian czarina?"

Sasha heaved a dramatic sigh and leaned dramatically into her fiance. "Alas, I fear you have discovered my secret."

"Speaking of secrets," Connie began, linking arms with her. "When are we gonna, ya know, announce the news to our friends?"

The brunette tapped her chin thoughtfully. "Soon, I guess. They'd kill us if we didn't. I kinda wanna continue this though."

Laughing, Connie kissed her once, quickly. "Who said we can't?"

-x-x-x-x-x-

On their next excursion, they decided to shoot for something lower and happily went to the local ice cream store. Working today was Levi Ackerman, a grumpy man whom they knew well, through his half-sister, Mikasa. They figured it'd be alright to "propose" here - their friends had to find out somehow, right?

"Hey," Connie dragged out the last consonant as he pulled Levi aside. "I've got something to tell you."

"What," Levi growled.

"Well, you see, Sasha and I -"

He didn't get to finish his sentence. A crash came from the kitchen, followed by a very loud "Ow!" that came from none other than Sasha Braus.

"Ugh, if your girlfriend broke anything," Levi threatened as he stomped off to assess the damage.

In the end...Connie never got to propose in Sina's Crystallized Treats. But since Levi felt bad (Sasha slipped on a wet patch on the floor that Levi missed dammit), they still walked out with free ice cream. No pain no gain.

-x-x-x-x-x-

"Where are you going?"

Sasha backtracked on her way out of the door and flashed a smile to combat Annie's scrutinizing gaze.

"Just going out with Connie," she said.

"Ah," Annie turned back to her magazine (there was some terrifying looking girl on the cover). "Enjoy."

You would never have known that Annie was the only one who knew about Connie's plans to propose...which had already occurred but she didn't need to know that...yet…

"Don't get mugged, use protection, all that jazz" Ymir muttered, running into the kitchen to grab a bottle of Vitamin Water. She consumed that stuff like alcohol.

"We're just going to a restaurant," Sasha said, rolling her eyes.

That caught Annie's attention once again. "You're going to a restaurant again? Didn't you go a couple days ago?"

"Yeah, you should definitely try that new Mexican restaurant downtown, it's so good." Sasha could almost feel her taste buds buzzing at the thought of their hot chili sauce.

"Does Connie have endless pockets or something?" Ymir asked, tipping her bottle in question. "I'm pretty sure every one of your dates this month have been to some new high-end restaurant or something."

"If I didn't know him I'd think he dealt drugs or something," Annie mumbled.

Sasha waved off her roommate's concerns. "Psh, of course not. We just found a way to...lower the prices."

Bad lie, but what were they gonna do about it?

Annie just rolled her eyes. "Right."

"You're not prostituting yourself are you?" Ymir yelled as Sasha proceeded to take her leave.

Chuckling with satisfaction as she locked the door, Sasha unfolded the map she carried. Each blue dot on the map represented restaurants they had visited, green represented restaurants they wanted to visit.

This was the best thing they had ever thought of - they had been eating well for almost a month.

And they still hadn't been caught.

Connie always managed to put a new twist on the proposal and Sasha put on such great theatrics her theater teacher would have been proud.

"Sasha Braus, will you marry me?" Connie asked, looking fervently into her eyes.

"Of course, you idiot," Sasha laughed, smearing cheese on Connie's nose.

"Hey!" he protested, and smeared some pesto on her cheek.

No one noticed the camera flash.

-x-x-x-x-x-

"YOU'RE GETTING MARRIED?!"

Sasha cringed. "What? Wait, how did you know?"

"It's in the paper!" Mina screeched, waving the headline in her face.

Aw, crap.

"Lemme see that!" Sasha snatched the paper away, and sure enough, there was a lovely article about "true love in an Italian atmosphere", along with a picture.

"Who's getting married?" Ymir poked her head out of the bathroom. "Wait, Sasha and the potato head?"

"No, you and Historia," Annie replied sardonically.

"I wish," Ymir snorted, walking back into the bathroom.

"About time," Annie muttered. "I helped that bald idiot buy a ring weeks ago."

"Wait, you knew about this?" Mina complained. "And you didn't tell me?"

"Mina, clearly you don't know what a secret is."

"Wait, where's the ring?" Mina asked.

As her roommates argued, Sasha had been firing off texts to Connie.

_Sasha Ganache: THE OPERATION HAS BEEN BREACHED! I REPEAT, THE OPERATION HAS BEEN BREACHED!_

"What?" Hearing her name, she looked up. "Oh, uh, it's in my room."

"I'll get it!" Ymir bellowed, running to Sasha's room.

The three of them followed. Ymir had popped open the black ring box, and she whistled.

"It's a nice one," she said, handing the box to Sasha. "Congrats, potato girl."

For once Sasha didn't protest the nickname. Even if she had wanted to, Mina immediately started fussing about the ring and telling Sasha to wear it.

This had gone a lot better than she thought it would, thank God.

"So when were you planning to tell us?" Annie crossed her arms and leaned against the doorframe.

Right. Annie.

"Um, soon," Sasha coughed.

"Connie bought the ring three weeks ago, I thought he was gonna propose soon after that. You never said anything so I thought he chickened out. But you guys were always on dates."

Sasha laughed nervously. "Well, funny story..."

"Hey, what's this?" Ymir picked up the folded map sitting on Sasha's dresser. "What is this, a hit list?"

"Yes!" Sasha exclaimed. "Well, sort of. They're restaurants."

Ymir examined the map. "How the hell have you been to so many restaurants?"

"I told you, we found a way to lower the prices," Sasha bluffed.

"You've been proposing at multiple restaurants to get free food, haven't you?" Annie deadpanned.

Sasha deflated. "How did you figure it out," she whined.

"You just told me."

"Ugh."

In the end...Sasha and Connie didn't have to pay for the meals they had snagged in the past, but they never pulled the stunt. Not that anyone knew of anyway. It was just as well, they had a wedding to pay for, after all.

"This will be a great story to tell the kids," Sasha mumbled sleepily as she rested her head on Connie's lap. Wedding planning was exhausting, thank goodness she had Historia and Hannah to help.

Connie chuckled. "Oh really? How many kids are you planning to have?"

"I dunno." Sasha cracked open one eye. "Right now a food baby is all I can handle."

She wasn't going to tell him yet...they had had enough excitement for one month. It could wait.


End file.
